Chapter Three:

Under Fire

Winters awoke with a start, flashing red lights were on the walls and people were getting up quickly and running around. In Basic whenever the red lights were sounded it meant red alert… which meant that they were under attack! Winters jumped up, grabbing his gear and putting them on. He put his body armor on with his extra padding shoulder pads. He then put his armor leggings on and boots. He grabbed his battlerifle and ran out into the main floor, where all the vehicles and weaponry were stored.

A black sergeant (nobody really knew his name) was gathering up the marines while people grabbed their gear. Everybody looked at the sergeant, they were in two parallel lines and he was at the front. "Alright men, listen up and listen up good! We are being attacked by the Covenant and their boarding ships are getting near us! We are getting everyone and I mean EVERYONE out of here so hurry your asses up, cover your buddies, and get to the emergency escape pods! We are getting the jeeps and tanks down on the ground, mostly to Earth now go, go, go!"

Winters nodded to himself and looked at the exits on each side of the room, trying to figure out which exit would be best to get out of here, trying to get a map in his mind. Through a few halls and through the lunch room you could get up the stairs and to the line of escape pods. He made sure he had lots of ammunition, his pistol, and some grenades. He turned his map on to make sure nothing would just spring out at him. He turned it off and went out one of the exits. There was a hall where one door to the side remained and a squad of marines were jogging through. He raced after them.

There were many hallways where men were gathering weapons, mostly pistols. The squad started to set up defenses (boxes and light, deployable machine guns mostly) in the middle of a room. At the end of the room there was a blast door, just a heavy door, which could be boarded. They just had to wait until the Covenant came through and they could just shoot them all down. Winters continued off, going into the lunch room while he heard screams and shots ring off.

The lunch room was big, tables, benches, chairs, and the kitchen. Winters kicked a bench over with his combat boot and hid behind it. There were two entrances to the lunch room, one was directly in front of Winters and another was to the very far right of him. He kneeled down and put his battlerifle to the top of the bench, looking through the scope with his left eye. He looked at the door; it opened as a dead marine dropped to the ground with blood all over his shoulders and neck.

Winters looked as an 'elite' walked through the door. Winters just had thoughts flash through his mind; he had never fought this enemy. He has no idea how to attack or what this alien is capable of doing. He looked down a bit and looked through his scope. The elite was huge, at least six feet tall and it had a sword made of energy. It had blue skin and smaller, much smaller, aliens followed it. They were grunts with plasma pistols. They shot towards Winters and he ducked, bringing his gun down with him. He brought it back up and let a few rounds ring off at them.

The first few string of bullets hit two grunts to the left and blue blood fell to the ground. He pulled the trigger once more, releasing more bullets, this time it killed the other two grunts and grabbed the elite's attention. The elite roared and started running at Winters. Winters threw a fragmentation grenade at the ground by the elite and it exploded, causing the alien to leap forward and go crashing to the ground. Winters stood over the dead body and let the rest of his clip go into the back of his head, blue blood all over the floor now.

He smirked and continued on his way. He took out a clip from his back pocket on his belt and hit it on his helmet once before shoving it into the bottom of the gun, hitting it twice with his palm. He went into the next hall, much longer than the others. He looked up and down the hall, seeing two marines hiding by the medical benches and cabinets. One had blood flowing from his knee and to the ground. Winters went and made sure nothing was around the hallway, looking at the two marines.

"Hey, do you guys know where the next hall leads?"

"Who might you be mate?" The marine had a British accent as he fixed up his buddy's knee.

"Private Conrad Winters, you?"

"Private First Class Tyler Burch, the hall leads to a staircase that leads to the escape pods. Woulda been there by now if this dipshit didn't get a plasma shot in his leg!"

"It aint my fault!" this person didn't have a British accent, more like an American Southern accent.

"Well, if I can help at all then tell me." Winters said.

"Not really, I need to get to the escape pods though mate, unless you can freeze time and fix this poor cunt up!"

"Sorry man, I would if I could. I could help you carry him if you could give me some good cover."

"Roger that, you alright with that Nolan?"

"Roger that!"

Winters helped Nolan stand up and put a hand over his shoulder for balance. Tyler picked up his assault rifle and fired down the hall at a few aliens with shields known as jackals. The sharp and large bullets from the assault rifle went through the shield basically and killed the jackals. Winters had a pistol in one hand in case he didn't get too much supporting cover. He went down another short hall and soon saw the staircase. He fired at the top landing, loads of Covenant and marines up there fighting. "Shit!"

"I'll find cover!" Nolan said and limped over to the bottom of the stairs, hiding behind them. On the bottom there was one squad of Covenant and a few marines. On the top were three squads of Covenant and a squad of marines. Winters nodded to Nolan and Tyler had already joined the marines on the bottom.

Winters went up the stairs, going up and then turning to see a group of grunts. He kneeled down and shot at them with his pistol, his battlerifle was on the string around his shoulder since he was helping Nolan walk. He ran out of bullets for his pistol and quickly twirled to his right, taking hold of his battlerifle and firing to his left, hitting an elite with a flurry of bullets before reloading. The elite dropped to the ground with blue blood all over the walls and a bit on the ceiling. Winters saw the rest of the marines chasing a squad of jackals off and the other squad had been killed by a few grenades.

Winter knew the drop pods were just around the corner and he looked down as Tyler and Nolan were fine. He rushed to an escape pod and jumped in, strapping himself in. It was very small and he saw the pilot was a female, but not Bohammer. He sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back.